The World's End: Exclusive Edgar Wright Interview and Still

The World’s End – the third and final part of Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright and Nick Frost’s genre-skewing trilogy that kicked off with Shaun of the Dead and continued with Hot Fuzz – is set to hit screens in the UK this August and the US in October.

And today we’ve got an exclusive look at the film in the shape of a brand new still. On top of that, we also had a chat with director Edgar Wright to get an update on the project, an insight into Simon Pegg’s goth past, and some information on how the story fits together with its predecessors…

Synopsis: 20 years after attempting an epic pub crawl, five childhood friends reunite when one of them becomes hellbent on trying the drinking marathon again. They are convinced to stage an encore by Gary King (Simon Pegg), a 40-year-old man trapped at the cigarette end of his teens, who drags his reluctant pals to their hometown and once again attempts to reach the fabled pub – The World’s End. As they attempt to reconcile the past and present, they realize the real struggle is for the future, not just theirs but humankind’s. Reaching The World’s End is the least of their worries.

Simon Pegg as Gary King in The World&#Array;s End.

IGN: How would you describe the movie?

Edgar Wright: It’s a boy’s night out movie gone wrong.

IGN: How will it differ to Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz?

Wright: We have tried to make them like a thematic trilogy. Because Hot Fuzz is slightly different from Shaun but they share aspects, and this too. They’re all different stories with different characters but they have thematic similarities that me and Simon are slightly obsessed with. But Shaun was about where we live – our neighbourhood in North London. And then Hot Fuzz was about going back home. Home for me and Simon in terms of a small town. But this one is about looking backwards. It’s more nostalgic. I think a lot about my adolescence and my teenage years and things I’d do differently. I have grand fantasies of going back in time and doing things better. Back to when I was 15 or 16. So there’s an element of that – whether it’s healthy to look or go backwards. That’s kind of what the theme of the film is.

IGN: The still is of Simon; so can you explain what’s happening?

Wright: That’s his map of the pubs in Newton Haven, which he had as a teenager. You can see on the map that nine pubs are crossed out because when they were teenagers they only got through nine of the 12 pubs. And he’s kept that map.

IGN: And what about the look of the character?

Wright: Simon went through a goth phase. If you’ve read Simon’s autobiography there are pictures of him as an Echo and the Bunnymen/Sisters of Mercy fan. And he did dye his hair black, so we thought that was a way to make him look distinctly different. The funny thing is I think he kind of pulls it off. He doesn’t look too tragic to me.

IGN: You’ve successfully kept the threat that the boys face in the film a secret thus far. How long do you think you’ll be able to keep that going?

Wright: I don’t know. The reason that you do that is so people can enjoy the film more. It’s not that there are major twists. I always feel there are some films that I wish I’d seen cold, so I’d love to try and retain a little bit of mystery. That said it really is what we say it’s about in the synopsis. The synopsis is not a smokescreen. It really is about five friends reuniting to try and recreate their pub crawl. That wasn’t a diversion tactic. That really is what the film’s about. But the film’s eight months from coming out so it’s pointless blowing everything now.

IGN: How do you think you’ve changed as a director since Shaun?

Wright: You learn on every job in terms of lots of different techniques. I wanted this one to feel like it was part of a piece with Shaun and Hot Fuzz. It doesn’t have major stylistic similarities with Scott Pilgrim. I’m always learning – I’m not one of those directors that thinks everything that I do is perfect. So you try to learn on the job and get better at things and try new things, which is important. In terms of a physical production, this was even more ambitious than Hot Fuzz, which had a lot of location work. But this does too. But also it’s great to be doing this in the UK. I think it’s important to really give the flavour of our country. There was a whole period when I was growing up that people would make films in the UK, but pretend they weren’t. And I think one of the things that helps in Shaun and Hot Fuzz and World’s End is that they feel British in a good way. It’s something that makes them unique – you’re not trying to make Transatlantic films that are trying to look like they are in Manhattan.

IGN: What do you hope people will get out of watching the trilogy when it’s all done and dusted?

Wright: Hopefully they might work like Michael Apted’s 7 Up series. And if you factor Spaced into it as well, you’ll see us getting older. But they have different concerns. I think this one is our way of wrapping up, with some finality, the man-child aspect of the series. There’s an element within all of the movies that’s about growing up. Shaun has to grow up to be a hero. In Hot Fuzz Nick Angel has to dumb down to Danny's level to save the day. And with this one I wanted to do something where… there’s a lot of American comedies in the last 10 years that have been about man children or dealing with responsibility. But I feel that they never get too deep under the surface. They bring up some aspects but don’t delve into them very deeply. And I think here we tried to skewer those movies in a sense.

That’s all from Edgar for now folks, but look out for our set visit coming soon, and head over to Empire for a look at some more new stills.

Chris Tilly is the Entertainment Editor for IGN in the UK and his hand briefly appears in Shaun of the Dead. He can be found in The Winchester, or on both Twitter and MyIGN.